Philadelphia Eagles and New England Patriots mascots are seen onstage before the JoJo Siwa performs at Nickelodeon at the Super Bowl Expereince during NFL Play 60 Kids Day on January 31, 2018 in Minneapolis, Minnesota.Mike Coppola / Getty Images for Nickelodeon

It’s game day! The New England Patriots take on the Philadelphia Eagles at U.S. Bank Stadium and excitement’s at an all-time high.

Game on for the calories – apparently pigging out is the name of the game! Bring on the typical Super Bowl fare, like pizza, beer, soda, chips, dips, wings and nachos, and you’re packing in at least 2,400 calories and 121 grams of fat, according to the Calorie Control Council. You’d have to run an entire marathon to burn it off!

Loosen that belt – actually just show up in your sweats. Super Bowl is the second most calorie-rich day of the year, out-eating Christmas and second only to Thanksgiving.

And you can count on a whole lot of distracted eating going on today, not only watching the action but those highly-anticipated commercials too, which cost at least $5 to $7 million for 30 seconds! Throw in the emotional eating too. According to a French researcher, if your team is losing you’ll eat more than your winning pals.

“We show that defeats by your favourite football or soccer team make you eat more, and less healthy food, especially if they were narrow, unexpected and against an opponent of the same strength,” reports Pierre Chandon, an Insead marketing professor at faculty.insead.edu. Eating away their sorrows can actually go on for a few days.

Pizza is the top snacking food making it super busy with deliveries. “We typically see a 45% increase in orders over your typical Sunday, and many of those orders are concentrated right before kickoff,” says Pat Finelli, chief marketing officer for Pizza Pizza, which expects more than 120 orders per minute throughout its locations across Canada.

Today is the biggest day sales-wise for pizza businesses followed by Halloween, New Year’s eve, New Year’s Day and Thanksgiving eve.

Well, here’s some food for thought as you’re scarfing down that pizza. Really get into the game and burn off those calories with help from Dr. Charles Platkin, a nutrition and public health advocate and founder of DietDetective.com, and the Director of the New York City Food Policy Center at Hunter College. Wanna work out the poundage? Platkin suggests the following:

– 10 buffalo crispy chicken wings = running the length of 149 football fields. Each wing has 95 calories each is 950 calories.

– Handful of mixed nuts = 44 minutes of football training camp. One ounce has about 170 calories.

– Eight potato chips with dip = 35 minutes of refereeing a football game. Each chip is 10.5 calories, plus a 1/2 tablespoon of French onion dip adds up to more than 200 calories.

– One cup of chili = face painting 22 wild fans. A cup of chili comes to about 350 calories. A blob of sour cream and shredded cheese is another 150 calories. Go for a bowl and be prepared for 73 minutes of cheerleading!

– Six Doritos chips = 18 minutes of cleaning your house after the Super Bowl party.

– Two slices of stuffed pizza with the works = 197 minutes of cleaning the stadium after the game.

– Five pretzels = 15 minutes walking around looking for your car after the game or 6.5 minutes of jumping up and down when your team scores.

– Two bottles of Budweiser beer = 267 touchdown dances in the end zone. Each beer is 145 calories.

How Much Is That?

The average cost of a ticket to the Super Bowl is more than $3,000.

Social platforms will see major action – 78% of fans will have their faces in the phones with Facebook being the most popular, followed by Twitter, Instagram and Snapchat.

What will they be sharing? Reaction to commercials for 38%, followed by reacting to the game 32%.

And all bets are on! BetOnline.ag has bets on everything going, from which team will win the coin toss and who’ll score the first touchdown to whether Justin Timberlake wears a hat at the half time festivities.

According to Sportsbook brand manager Dave Mason: “We will have 500+ props available – even the novelty-type props like length of National Anthem take on lots of bets. Bettors like to have action all game long on anything and everything possible.”

Pigskin Rituals

Besides betting, here are other Canadian football rituals, according to a survey from PepsiCo Foods Canada/Tostitos Time Spent Watching NFL Football:

66% of Canadian NFL fans watch the NFL for more than three hours every Sunday during the football season.

25% of Canadian NFL viewers spend more than five hours each Sunday watching NFL football.

45% of those watching three to four hours every Sunday are women, while only 37% of Canadian men report watching NFL games three to four hours on Sundays.

25% sit in the same spot every Sunday to watch the games.

25% invite friends over to watch the game.

21% buy their favourite chips from the grocery store in bulk – this is a game day ritual for 24% of males.

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